Field
This application relates to network communications. In particular, this application is related to a method and system for communicating information between a mobile device and an enterprise system.
Description of Related Art
There are many instances where it is desirable to ingest information presented on a web page into an application for further processing. In the past, application developers resorted to downloading the web page and scraping the web page to find the desired information. Scraping typically involves searching for certain keywords on the web page that identify information on the web page. The obvious problem with this approach is that the scraping algorithm requires a degree of consistency in the layout of the web page. When the layout changes, the scraping algorithm may need to be changed accordingly.
To overcome this issue, some web servers provide a web service application program interface (API) that streamlines access to the information stored or accessible via the web server. Generally, a web service API exposes certain processes for communicating information to and from the web server. Processes of the API are called by sending an extensible markup language (XML) message to the web server that includes an exposed GET process for getting a particular type of information and possibly input values required by the GET process. The web server responds with an XML formatted RESPONSE message that includes the requested values.
XML documents are text files that define a tree structure of various elements. The elements are identified by tags and may be nested. That is, elements can have child elements. The XML messages utilized by the web service API typically conform to a simple object access protocol (SOAP) that defines the general structure of XML GET and RESPONSE messages utilized by the web service API.
A typical SOAP message includes an envelope element that identifies the XML document as a SOAP message, a header element that contains header information, a body element that contains call and response information, and a fault element that includes errors and status information. The body element is utilized to specify either the GET process and its associated input values, or the RESPONSE and its associated response values.
While the procedure described above for accessing information provides for a universal method for accessing information, it does have its shortcomings. One of those shortcomings is that the messages tend to be relatively large in relation to the amount of data being requested. For example, calling a GET process for accessing the address of an individual requires not only a body element that specifies, for example, a GET_ADDRESS process and input value that specifies the name of the individual, but also the other elements required by the SOAP protocol (i.e., the envelope, header, etc.). Similarly, the RESPONSE message will include not only the desired address, but also an envelope, header, etc. This problem is exacerbated when the amount of information requested comes in the form of an array of values, because each value in the array is expressed within its own element in the XML message. That is, each value includes opening and closing tags for identifying the element.
Another problem resides in the fact that an application processing an XML RESPONSE message has to parse the XML file to extract the requested information. Parsing of XML messages tends to be a cumbersome and slow process, which increases processing time.
These shortcomings can present challenges when trying to access web server information from a mobile device. For example, the increased processing time required for parsing the XML messages increases the amount of time it takes for a given application to respond to a request for information. This in turn decreases the battery life of the mobile device, because the processor has to be in an active mode for a longer period. Similarly, the relatively large XML messages for getting and receiving information take a relatively long time to transmit and receive. Thus, the RF section of the mobile device will have to remain active for a longer period, which reduces the battery life further.